Square: from Dongle to Domination

I had the opportunity to write an opinion/profile of Square for the SIBOS edition of Informilo:

Here is the introduction and link to the full piece:

“In 2008, glass blower James McKelvey was unable to complete a $2,ooo sale of his glassware because a customer could only pay by credit card. Frustrated, he discussed this with a friend, Jack Dorsey, the founder of Twitter. By the summer of 2009, Dorsey had prototyped a dongle and soon after, Square launched as a payments start-up targeting mainly the unservied micro-merchant space.

Fast forward to 2012. Square’s recent capital raise of $200 million implies a $3.25 billion valuation. Its valuation quadrupled between January and June 2011 and then doubled over the past year. This latest capital raise implies around 30x – 40x estimated revenue. In contrast, payment companies tend to be valued between 3x and 5x revenue multiples. What does this mean for the industry?” …